GENERATION KILL

It's been a long time since HBO has had a decent series.

The subscription network was hitting home runs regularly with the likes of The Sopranos, Band of Brothers, Deadwood, Entourage and (for some people, I guess) Sex in the City.

But ever since the series so-called finally of The Sopranos, their offerings have been pretty boring and forgettable. The network's recent series, Tell Me You Love Me and In Treatment, seem to be an exploration into how boring other peoples' psychoses can be (although, Tell Me You Love Me earns a pass for the full-frontal nudity).

But I was really pleased with the initial episode of Generation Kill, the seven-part miniseries that follows an elite squad of Marines through the first 40 days of the Iraq war. It is based on the book of the same name by Evan Wright, an embedded journalist writing for Rolling Stone during the invasion.

The production did a great job of keeping showing the tedium of pre-invasion dessert life in Kuwait -- how soldiers dealt with heat, boredom, training equipment shortages and questionable leadership -- as they prepared to be the tip of the spear into Iraq.

The anti-military bias, if there is one, is only very subtle, and -- at least in the initial episode -- the narrative seems to be more concerned with presenting the day-to-day lives of the men on the front line, than with overt political statements about the war itself.

The violence in the first episode was pretty tame as well, especially when compared to The Sopranos and Band of Brothers. Of course the war is just starting, so I expect this to get a little more intense.

Overall, I'm looking forward to seeing the remaining episodes, and I'm keeping the DVR set.



tagged: HBO, Generation Kill, Sopranos, Band of Brothers, Tell Me You Love Me, In Treatment, Iraq, Marines

Enjoy your new iPhone

Courtesy of Nitrozac & Snaggy:

tagged: iPhone, comic, Apple, technology

Friday Blogthing: Something to believe in

Much like 80's glam rock band Poison, Barack Obama has won the adoration of masses of people by using tired, trite, over-sentimentalized platitudes.

Now thanks to the power or the interwebz, we can translate the politicians words into webby truthiness.

Hat tip to Blandwagon.





tagged: Poison, Something to Believe In, glam, Barack Obama, Friday, politics

That old feeling

This could be a little confusing, so pay close attention...

I got a txt msg from my younger sister last night that my niece, the daughter of my older sister, is pregnant.

So first of all, congratulations to my niece. She married her husband a couple of years ago and has built a good career (as has her husband). This is the next step for them and they'll be great parents.

It's still very early in the pregnancy, and lots of times these things "don't take" the first time. But if this is turns out to be a viable pregnancy, that would mean my sister will be a GRANDMOTHER!

Which, if you've been following along, makes me a Great Uncle (I mean, I'm already a great uncle by virtue of being an all around great guy. But now I could be a Great Uncle as well).

I am NOT old enough to be a Great Uncle.

Okay, here's the big caveat: My niece (the one who's pregnant) is the stepdaughter of my older sister. To the best of my recollection she was already in nearing junior high age when my sister became her stepmom.

But still, it makes you feel the cold breath of age on your neck to think that your sister is a grandmother.

Weird.

tagged: family, old, age, sister, niece, uncle

Spies like us

FYI... the Democrat-controlled Senate has approved a bill to allow the government to spy on Americans.

Candidate Obama voted in favor of the spying bill. I wonder if that's what he means by "candidate of change."

tagged: Senate, spy, bill, eavesdropping, surveillance, Obama, candidate

Dentally unstable

So I'm rushing around at the office at about a quarter past two yesterday afternoon.

I have a 3 p.m. dentist appointment and I know it will take at least 30 minutes to drive, find a parking place and run up a long flight of stairs to the office. On top of that, I have a conference call that I can't miss from 2-3 p.m. I know I'm cutting the timing close on this.

I print out the spreadsheet for the meeting, dial in to the conference on my cell phone and begin shutting down my computer. I have to be in my car in 15 minutes if I'm going to make my appointment.

Twenty minutes later I'm on the road, hands-free phone on mute, spreadsheet in one hand and steering wheel in the other. Yes, I've become that guy. On a meeting, driving down the highway, referring to a lines on a spreadsheet that are too small to read and speeding to try to get to my appointment.

Luckily, I don't kill my self or anyone else in an auto accident. I find a parking place right in front of the door to the dentist's office and run up the stairs with enough time to grab a quick sip from the drinking fountain and still arrive three minutes early.

So I had a frantic trip to the office. Keep that in mind for a minute or two.

I sit down in the exam chair and the dental hygienist pulls out a blood pressure cuff. Evidently in the six months since my last cleaning, this office has decided that blood pressure checks are a vital part of dental hygiene. Is this new? Does your dentist do this? I can't decide if my dentist is on the cutting edge of dental care, or just pretending to be a real doctor.

Anyway, the blood pressure reading comes in slightly elevated. I chalk it up to the craziness of the last hour or so, not to mention a bit of anxiety about being at the dentist in the first place. Now don't get me wrong, I don't have any kind of pathological fear of the dentist. But come on, does anybody really look forward to having their gums probed with sharpened steel implements? Really?

As a quick aside here, let me just pause to reiterate my incredulity that here we are, living in the future, where modern medicine is performing miracles like giving site to the blind and allowing men to have babies, yet dentists are using technology that is little changed since medieval times. Come on dentists! Where are the fricken' lasers to clean my teeth!

Anywho, Jabby McStabyourgums commences the teeth cleaning, noting she'll just take another blood pressure reading after the cleaning, when I've had a chance to relax. As if 10 minutes of having stainless steel hooks scraped across my teeth and under my gums is the equivalent of smoking a joint while getting deep tissue massage.

The exam/cleaning is finished. I have no cavities (of course) and I get a nice little parting gift of a new toothbrush, floss and toothpaste (travel size, the cheapskates) as I get up. McStabyourgums forgets to recheck my blood pressure, and I don't remind her.

I think it' s a pretty safe bet that it was higher.

tagged: dentist, gums, blood pressure, medieval, torture

YouTube Tuesday: Not voting is easy, more than half the population does it

Now, everyone can participate in pretending to participate in the political process. There's really no excuse for not not getting involved.



tagged: election, voting, politics, satire, Onion, video, humor, YouTube

Race-ism

Back to the Tour de France for a minute...

Kansas City's modern day Hemingway, Midtown Miscreant, commented previously that pro cycling "...just seems like nascar on bikes to me."

Well, my friends, nothing could be further from the truth (well, okay, calling Obama the "candidate of change" might be a little further from the truth, but I don't want to get all political right now).

I don't blame MM for his misconceptions. Your average barbecue-eatin', gas guzzlin' midwesterner probably knows more about Britney Spears that the Brittany region of France.

So let me take a few moments to clarify how the Tour de France is totally unlike NASCAR racing...

• In NASCAR, machines do all the work. In cycling, drugs do all the work.
  
  
• In a typical NASCAR race weekend, cars use 6,000 gallons of gas. In a typical Tour de France, the support caravan (team cars, team buses, race officials, ambulances, etc.) uses 6,000 gallons of gas.
  
  
• In cycling, riders maneuver left and right at high rate of speed down treacherous mountain switchbacks. In NASCAR, drivers turn left.
  
  
• If I miss coverage of a NASCAR race, I don't get upset. If I miss coverage of the Tour de France, I get upset. And when I get upset, people die.
  
  
• In NASCAR, drivers take pit stops. In cycling, riders strap on a feed bag.
  
  
• The Tour de France rolls through picturesque medieval villages and French countryside. NASCAR blasts through places like Atlanta.
  
  
• In NASCAR, speed is measured in miles per hour. In cycling, it's kilometers per hour. So, yeah, totally different.
  
  
• In NASCAR, the announcers have a hickish sounding accent. In cycling, the announcers have a refined and sophisticated sounding accent.
  
  
• In NASCAR, the race winner gets to burn rubber on the track. In cycling, the race winner gets to French kiss those two cute Crédit Lyonnais chicks.

tagged: racing, NASCAR, cycling, Tour de France, Brittany, Atlanta, mussettes

Support KC metro's newest pro-sports team

With the Royals assuming their usual seat at the bottom of their division, and the Chiefs gearing up for another lackluster season, we're kind of entering the dog days of pro-sports in this town.

But fear not, local sports fan. Starting Saturday, the metro area's newest pro sports team takes to the field, or rather road, when the 2008 Tour de France commences with it's first stage from Brest to Plumelec.

That's right, Kansas City's (well, Olathe's) hometown GPS house, Garmin, is the primary sponsor of the Garmin-Chipotle team (aka Slipstream).

Each summer I look forward to the Tour to fill the void created by crappy reality TV, lackluster baseball and lame sitcom reruns. This year I was pleased to see Garmin and Chipotle pick up the sponsorship of Slipstream, especially given the "clean cycling" mantra of the team.

In this case, clean cycling has nothing to do with lower carbon footprints or eco-friendly biofuels. Rather, it's the team's goal of trying to shed the shadow of doping that has darkened the world of pro-cycling for years.

It will be interesting to see how this team does. One of my favorite rising stars of the past few tours, Dave Zabriske, is on the team, but he suffered a serious crash in Italy, so I'm not sure if he'll be available for the Tour. That's a shame.

Otherwise, the team has a pretty good lineup Tour riders including some experience in David Millar, Magnus Backstedt and Christian Vande Velde, and it is headed by former pro Jonathan Vaughters.

Still given the focus on eliminating performance enhancing doping, it's questionable whether any of the team members will be on the podium when the Tour rolls in to Paris on July 27.

But if they can live up to their anti-doping philosophy, it's a team that Garmin can be proud to sponsor.



tagged: sports, cycling, doping, Slipstream, Garmin, Tour de France, Chipotle

Can't stand the Chiefs

A big tip o' the hat to PDSH who hepped me to this Yahoo! Sports link where the author cracks wise about the Kansas City Chief's new "Fan Code of Conduct."

In theory, it's not a bad idea, as you'd like your stadium to provide a friendly atmosphere for families and people who aren't drunken hooligans.

In practice, though, it might not be such a great idea, especially if the person responsible for coming up with the rules is an 85-year-old woman who teaches the 2nd grade and regards standing up as one of the evil things that young whippersnappers often do.

Indeed, the "code of conduct" expressly forbids "excessive standing" during the games. And good! Because frankly, I really get annoyed by people who stand at sporting events, so I'm glad the Chiefs are saying that excessive standing is prohibited.

Also, I agree that "foul, obscene" language is being banned. I mean, where is it written that people should have the freedom to speak as they please? What, do they thing they have some sort of right to free speech or something?

And, I applaud the chiefs for arming their workers with jack boots and billy clubs to make sure that fans aren't "failing to follow instructions of stadium personnel."

With these measures in place, I'm sure we as fans can look forward to an orderly, controlled, manageable, obedient season.

Yay.

tagged: sports, Kansas City, Chiefs, football, fan, conduct